Hoodies from the past prove that teenage angst is nothing new

Yet again, concerned specialists are about to sit down at a conference to discuss the insufferable habits of anti-social teenagers, hoodies and "feral youths" - but with one difference. The hoodlums' atrocities, including peeing shamelessly in the street as their betters processed past on the way to church, took place more than 700 years ago.

Families from hell, adolescent angst and pre-teen mothers all figure on the agenda of the world's biggest conference of medieval historians, due to take place in Leeds next month. It will be held less than three miles from an area with one of the country's highest concentrations of young people served with anti-social behaviour orders.

Scholarly figures from libraries and archives in the United States and Asia, as well as Europe and the Arab world, will be treated to papers rich in the language of New Labour, although measures to deal with wayward youth at the time were more akin to the more extreme demands of representatives at a Conservative party conference. Illustrations to monkish manuscripts, which in part played the role of today's inflammatory newspapers, show young heads, as well as hoods, rolling in the gutter after outbreaks of disorder.

"The discipline of medieval studies is thriving around the globe because it covers all aspects of the culture we hold in common, then and now," said Axel Müller of Leeds University, the director of the annual International Medieval Congress.

"So many of the of the problems - and successes - we encounter in our own society have their counterparts in the medieval world. Studying them can teach us about the great questions: how to live, the uses of power and culture - and how to respect the old and deal with the young."

Respect is a word which will jump out repeatedly from the conference's 200-plus expert papers, almost as often as it has in post-general election announcements from government departments. Jane Maltby, a medievalist whose MA dissertation looks at potentially lethal sartorial distinctions in Icelandic society, said: "Respect was a huge issue in the middle ages and there are so many instances of discussion and debate about its place."

Hoodies were also a familiar part of the medieval scene, not just in the respectable cowls of monks and friars but also as the badge of outlaws, including the most famous of them all, Robin Hood. Although CCTV was centuries away, the loose wrap-around headgear was an ideal way of vanishing into the crowds after a spot of anti-social behaviour.

"There were many examples of laws about correct clothing," said Isabelle Cochelin of Toronto University in Canada, who has organised the conference's main theme of Youth and Age. "In the early middle ages, this was often related to economy: younger people had to wear shorter garments to save on cloth, but as time went on, that changed."

The big clashes came, then as now, when young people reached puberty and almost panic-stricken measures were taken to suppress their libido, particularly in the largely male world of monasteries.

Professor Cochelin said: "Older people tried to enforce their authority particularly strictly just at the moment when the younger ones were starting to feel their own energy. We get the first references to young people rejecting their parents' authority and asserting their own will. But this was a society where people died young, by our standards, and so it was necessary to start to hand over authority to the next generation at an earlier stage."

Whether or not that has implications for today, and talk of reducing the voting age to 16 and allowing 18-year-olds to stand for parliament, it served as a medieval safety valve. So too did a willingness by hierarchies to absorb the medieval equivalent of a V-sign into official ritual, shown in the inclusion of crude lampoons in religious "mystery" plays such as the cycle, still performed every four years in York.

"Our papers always throw up some surprises," said Dr Müller, whose previous conferences have included the construction of a medieval siege catapult. "At a time when we're concerned about respect for authority, what should we make of the image of a boy urinating as a solemn procession passes by? We have a paper, 'Pissing on the Parade', which covers just this subject."

The medieval historians, whose subject is attracting increasing numbers of student applicants at British universities, will also have a dinner of ingredients and recipes used at the court of King Richard II, the monarch (from 1377-1399) who was murdered in a particularly unpleasant way at Pontefract castle. Other papers include a study of virgins at war and a run through of medieval equivalents of the Zimmer frame.

From breeches to baggy jeans

Then

Short breeches for boys or a kirtle skirt for girls (to save cloth). Linen undershirts beneath and, in most cases, linen drawers. Woollen cloaks, often dyed bright colours, on top with a woollen hood, usually worn over the head but sometimes thrown back as in modern academic gowns. Leggings common, often cross-gartered. Wooden clogs or heavy cloth or leather shoes, the last specially among those who had done well from thieving. Rougher societies saw a deliberate emphasis on accentuating genitalia; one Icelandic saga describes how a man called Bróka-Authr was divorced for wearing breeches "gored" in the crotch, a style which had its own name (like "hoodie"): setgeirabrækr.

Now

Contemporary hoodies get their name from the hooded sweatshirt worn with its hood pulled up over a baseball cap, hiding the face in what some older observers consider a sinister cave. Baggy jeans are often worn startlingly low-slung. Tracksuit bottoms are an acceptable alternative. Socks are normally invisible under droops of trouser bottom, with trainers mandatory footwear. Boys and girls accessorise with chunky gold jewellery and mobile phones. Also known as "chav" style (much debate about etymology) typified by Man Utd footballer Wayne Rooney and girlfriend Colleen McLoughlin. Habitat: given to loitering on street corners and in shopping malls (where not banned with hood in "on" position).

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